Looking for something to do this weekend without having to sift through your newspaper or scour the web for a fun event? Weotta, a new startup launching today at TechCrunch Disrupt, is looking to help (say the name out loud).
The service offers a very easy 3-step process for making a plan: first, tell it what kind of outing you’re embarking on (Business, Dating, Family, Friends, or Solo). Next, pick the mood. Finally, hit the generate button, and you’re good to go.
Once you’ve hit ‘Generate’, the service will present you with a handful of itineraries, each of which provides an at-a-glance overview of the event, with pins marking the venues and small icons depicting the atmosphere, time of day, and more (the icons are reminiscent of the ones you’d find in a hotel guide).
You can also use filters to refine your suggestions, choosing the time of date, date range, geographic radius that the event can encompass, and more.
Weotta also helps you quickly find events that are focused around current concerts and movies, and using your Facebook Likes and social graph to make recommendations.
Once you’ve chosen an event, you can invite your friends using Facebook. You can also book reservations and/or purchase tickets using services including OpenTable.
Q&A
Q: How does it work?
A: Hundreds of signals, scouring the web. It learns as you use it and as more people around you use it. Using Facebook profile at this point, but it’s going to get richer (not very much of it is used now).
Q: Why a web app not a mobile app?
A: Did interviews — found that most people do planning while they are at work. That’s why we launched this first.
Q: I find this exciting.. a lot of traditional media falls short of being able to do this. Big question for most people, it’s date night, what am I going to do. Inevitably, if I’m single this is great. If I’m going on a date how does it know what my date is interested in?
A: First layer: we’ll give you idea of what other people have done on dates. Could collaborate too. Haven’t released that yet.
Q: Normally trying to figure out also who you can do things with.
A: Here’s where we can tie into Facebook. FB Events has been relatively ignored to where it could be.
Q: Is there a feedback system so you can go back and say this worked, didn’t work.
A: There will be, we’re working on it.
Weotta cleans, classifies, and connects the real world around us, turning unstructured place and event data into contextually relevant results. Their deep ontology enables you to make requests like, “Give me a romantic Japanese restaurant”, “Tell me where to go on a classy date”, or “Where should I go after the game”. They were a TechCrunch Disrupt New York 2011 finalist. To showcase their capabilities at Disrupt they created the WeottaMakePlans itinerary generator. Recently, they launched the mobile...
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